


8.01: A Human Heart

by idlesuperstar



Series: The Crooked Roads [10]
Category: Spooks | MI-5
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-06
Updated: 2019-06-06
Packaged: 2020-04-06 19:47:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,305
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19069453
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/idlesuperstar/pseuds/idlesuperstar
Summary: He can’t have come through yesterday, through nine years of doubt, to have it end likethis.Before he can make amends.





	8.01: A Human Heart

**Author's Note:**

> This is a sidelong look at ep 8:01 from Lucas' brainpan. If you've not seen the ep then it won't make much sense. Go and watch that instead. 
> 
> This takes place the day after the previous fic. 
> 
> Title from William Blake's separate but linked [The Divine Image ](https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/43656/the-divine-image)/[A Divine Image ](https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/45953/a-divine-image). Intertitles are Proverbs of Hell from Blake's [ _The Marriage of Heaven and Hell_](http://www.bartleby.com/235/253.html).
> 
> Series notes are [here](http://archiveofourown.org/series/136827).

 

There’s something different in the quality of the air.

Lucas opens his eyes slowly, lying there for a moment, listening to the sounds of the city. They’re not _wrong,_ just unusual.

Distant sounds of kids. Not many cars. The familiar rumble of buses.

London is still there, then.

He breathes out, slowly. Looks at the sunlight falling across the bookshelves. Turns his head to look at his alarm clock.

_11.17AM_

Christ on a _bike_ , he’s slept in. He can’t help but smile. Ros is going to be unbearably smug.

 

He stares at the ceiling. He thinks of all the things he should be doing. Getting up, checking his stitches, a shower, getting dressed, breakfast, walking to work, bracing for the latest crisis.

It all feels weirdly distant. Someone else’s problem. He could just lie here, instead. His bed is unbelievably comfortable right now.

He stretches his legs out, carefully, testing the flex of pain in his side.

Thinks about putting his oldest, rattiest, softest jeans and t-shirt on, about lying in a park with a book, dozing in the sun.

His mind drifts, light and blurry.

He falls back into a doze.

 

~

 

Eventually, he can’t ignore the need to piss any longer, or the increasing throb of pain in his side, and reluctantly comes out of dreams.

Sitting up to get out of bed is more difficult than he’d like to admit. He's moving like an old man, stiff and unbending.

His phone rings when he’s waiting for his tea to brew, his hair still damp from the shower. Ros.

“You told me to sleep in,” he says, fake-complaining.

“We’ve had a message about Harry,” she says, voice tight, and Lucas is already heading for the bedroom as she says “I need you here.”

She doesn’t say sorry, it’s Ros, but he hears a tinge of it in her voice.

 

* * *

 

“The official line is that we’re studying it for authenticity,” he says, flatly, trying to sound professional.

It can’t possibly be real. If it’s real, he’ll never get to talk to Harry.

He can’t have come through yesterday, through nine years of doubt, to have it end like _this_. Before he can make amends.

 

He watched the video at least ten times before he showed it to the rest of the team. It doesn’t make it any easier.

Jo flinches when the shot happens.

Ros - as ever - deflects her fear with flippancy, but this is the worst time for it. Lucas has never seen Malcolm so angry before. He’s not sure Ros has ever been spoken to like this. To her credit, she apologises to Malcolm with quiet sincerity.

“Despite our personal involvement,” Lucas says, trying to get them all looking in the same direction, “we treat Harry just like any missing asset.”

He looks at Malcolm, at this dedicated, weary, loyal man, and says, offering faint hope, “We still don’t have a body.”

 

~

 

Lucas has withstood bomb blasts with Ros and seen her not move a muscle, but in the corridor, away from the others, she’s unsettlingly shaken.  

He supposes it’s a compliment that she’ll let him see it. On another day he’d be pleased about that.

“That video’s not genuine,” she says, decisive. It’s bravado, really, but he’ll take it.

 

* * *

_The crow wish'd every thing was black, the owl, that every thing was white._

 

Lucas stands by the gurney, looking at the cold white sheet over the body. He thinks about the Russian agents that didn’t kill him yesterday. He thinks about the Russian agents he’s killed, in London, and in Moscow. Wonders, for the first time in a long time, if Arkady ended up on a slab, disposed of neatly by his erstwhile colleagues.

He deliberately doesn’t think of Oleg.

 

He pulls the sheet down. A very tidy execution.

 

“Viktor Sarkisian,” says an American voice behind him, jarring him from the thought.

He watches her as she speaks on the phone, all code names, cockiness and fake flirting. She’s pretty, in a cool, polished way. Like a modern politician. He wonders if she speaks in soundbites.

He’s looking at Sarkisian’s amputated finger when she finishes her call.

“Sarah Caulfield,” she finally deigns to introduce herself. CIA Liaison. It all slots into place. “In with the new,” she says, with unassailable confidence. An idealist? Or a zealot?

 

He’s not surprised that she knows as much as they do about the video. The cousins have always had more money, more resources, more fingers in dirtier pies.

He _is_ surprised that she’s here, playing nice. Or pretending to. Yes, Harry’s possible execution is big news, but it’s not like them to make the first move.

 

Harry - and by extension the team - has always been pragmatic enough to maintain friendly relations with the CIA. It’s a long standing relationship of mutual game playing and distrust, veneered over with diplomacy.

 

Lucas is rusty at the niceties, but he knows enough to appear open and willing to exchange intel. Give her chickenfeed, and she might come back with some gold.

He also knows enough not to trust her further than necessary.

He looks again at the bloody stub of Sarkisian’s finger. Harry walked into that bargain with Sarkisian with his eyes open, but if it’s brought about his death then Lucas wishes with fierce sincerity that the finger was cut off a live body.

 

* * *

 

“I’m going to war with the Home Secretary on this one,” says Ros, like she’s deciding what to have for lunch. Lucas feels briefly sorry for the Home Secretary, and squashes a grin.

 

He leaves Jo to her intel, wanders over to where Malcolm is watching the video on repeat, headphones on, straining with concentration. He stands and watches it loop for a minute, then presses an unfelt hand to Malcolm’s shoulder and leaves him to it.

 

He thinks about sitting at his desk, looking through the intel again. But sitting down would mean having to get _out_ of a chair again, at some point. He’s done his best to avoid that all day. He doesn’t want the team to see it.

He looks at his watch. It’s seven hours since he took any codeine. The pain is dragging him down. He can take a break for a few minutes.

Necking some pills with the last of his cold coffee, he leaves the grid, walks until he finds a quiet bench by the river, picking up a sandwich on the way.

 

He levers himself down onto the seat, breathing out like a woman in labour. Presses a hand to his side. It’s warm, but not much more than the rest of him. He sits and eats his sandwich, and waits for the pain to lessen.

 

_The river sweats_

_Oil and tar_

 

The Thames is grey-green, even under blue skies. It’s odd to think it’s cleaner than it’s ever been. Now the boats are mostly tourist ones, the wharfs and factories flats and bars for yuppies. Whatever yuppies are called these days.

 

Harry _has_ to still be alive.

 

* * *

 

When he gets to the grid the next morning, Malcolm looks like he hasn’t moved. Then Lucas realises he _hasn’t_ moved. He’s still in yesterday’s clothes.

Malcolm - quiet, capable, dogged Malcolm - has found an anomaly in the video.

 

Ros comes back with the news that the lead that Hillier from Six gave them on Hassain looks much more like Hillier covering his own very dirty tracks.

The bad news is it’s time wasted on something that’s not finding Harry.

The good news is that it bolsters Malcolm’s find. They’re a step closer to finding out just how real  - or fake - the video is.

 

~

 

Malcolm’s not just been watching the death video all night, it seems.

He’s only fucking gone and found what might be the place the video was shot. Lucas could hug him, if it wouldn’t freak him out.

“Brilliant, Malcolm,” he says, hope sparking, “let’s get a team down there.”

 

~

 

Waiting for the forensics results is interminable, even though they’ve been expedited to fuck. He spends the hour or so it takes looking through dead leads and the messy history of S.A.R.V.

Finally the email pings through. He clicks on it with a shaking hand.

When he calls the team round his voice is scratchy.

“Sarkisian was executed there,” he says, having read the report three times, just to make sure, “but none of the blood was Harry’s.”

“Then he’s alive,” Jo says, speaking for all of them, her voice buoyant with relief.

Lucas doesn’t think he’s ever seen Ros smile like that before.

 

* * *

 

He’s in the conference room when he sees Ruth come onto the grid. She looks dazed, hunched into herself. He’d seen men come into Lubyanka like that, shellshocked, sleepwalking. The ones who’d been snatched out of their normal lives and thrown unwillingly into their nightmare.

When he’d come back everything had been too loud, too fast, too bright, too crowded. He remembers sharply the taste of the vinegar on his chips, the clean smooth look of Adam, the jagged clattering edges of London, of the grid.

Remembers how Malcolm had come up to him, quiet and kind, and just been - normal.

 

He approaches her slowly, gives her warning, space.

“I’m sorry we have to meet under these circumstances,” he says to her, gently.

“Why was I attacked?” she asks, with a directness that’s unexpected, but impressive.

 

~

 

“What did Harry ever share with you that was for your ears only?” Ros asks, steady and calm, like they have all the time in the world.

Lucas watches Ruth, sees her eyes flickering, riffling through her memories for something that might be this big. There’s a groundedness about her, even in this situation, that he likes a lot. She’s panicking, but she’s thinking.

He sees the moment she catches on something.

“Ruth,” he says, low, and it’s barely a question.

“Baghdad,” she says, finally, reluctantly. “I think this might be about Baghdad.”

 

By which she means a covert op half a decade or so ago to smuggle WMDs into Iraq, and then conveniently discover it. An op that involved rogue agents from the CIA, Six, and Indian intelligence. Because heaven fucking forfend the public find out the war was unjustified. _Christ._

“Harry _stopped_ it,” Ruth says, defiant.

He not only stopped it, he got the uranium out, and back home. And he told _Ruth._

Lucas looks at her, at the person Harry trusted, trusts, above all others.

Thinks of what a terrible burden trust can be.

 

~

 

Lucas and Ros reconvene and try to slot the pieces of this messy puzzle together.

Ruth named McCall, Sarah Caulfield’s predecessor, as the CIA agent involved. Which might explain why the Americans have their prints all over this.

The Six agent was Hillier. No wonder he’s been misdirecting them.

Ros proffers Mani as the Indian agent, and Harry’s captor.

They stare at the photos, offering and discarding theories.

“There’s something else going on here,” he says finally.

Ros, with a half smile, tells him to shake the CIA’s tree gently.

 

* * *

 

Caulfield is happy to meet him in Westminster. It suits him, but he’s wary of her generosity. He’s finding it hard to get a handle on her. He wonders if he’s doing her a disservice. Maybe she’s just new and eager to do a good job. Ambitious, perhaps. Years of this life have smothered his instinct to trust people. He’s not sure if his gut is right, or he’s just conditioned now to suspect everyone.

It unsettles him more than he’d like to admit that he can’t read her yet.

Still, he needs intel, and good relations. And she’s part of a new administration that he can’t help being hopeful about.

So he smiles, and thanks her, and hopes he sounds like he means it.

 

* * *

  

There’s still something missing in this, he’s sure of it. A thread he can’t quite grasp. Ros agrees, although being Ros, she also disagrees. But she feels it too. There’s a bigger picture they’re not seeing.

 

~

 

Ros comes back from her meet with Hillier looking more pissed off than usual. It’s soon clear why. McCall is tidying up before he goes home, and he doesn’t care who gets splattered with blood while he does it. He's going to regret it, when Ros gets him.  _If_ they get him. 

Lucas feels their chances of getting to Harry slipping away. This day is fucking him about so much.

“If Sarah Caulfield can get a tracker onto McCall he’ll lead us to Harry,” Ros says. As if it’s that simple.

“How do I persuade her to do that?” he asks, in a tone bordering insubordinate.

“Any means necessary,” Ros says, looking him straight in the eye.

Lucas offers up a silent prayer. _The things I do for my country._

 

* * *

 

Caulfield looks like she wants to throw him out of the window and is not bothered about him knowing.

“So much for the new broom,” he says. This is probably not what Ros meant by _I’d try charm first._

“Your mess,” she says, dismissive, even angry. There’s a spark there, something under that cool veneer.

He drops down to her level, lowers his voice. “Let’s work together on this one.”

He holds her gaze, keeps talking, waiting for the look in her eye that says he’s got her on side.

“Anything you want.”

He sees it. She says nothing, but he’s got her.

 

* * *

 

“You promised the CIA both _Mani_ and the _uranium_?”

Lucas grins at Ros’ expression. He thinks it’s the first time he’s really surprised her.

He knows full well Harry will countermand that order. They all do. But Harry will be back. Which is all that matters.

And then they’re all grinning, because it’s not every day you get to double cross the cousins and get out of it relatively clean.

 

~

 

He was right, he got her. McCall’s trackable.

He and Ros leave Jo to it and head off to join the intercept team. Ros is just as bad as he is at sitting back and watching. And besides, he has to do all he can. He owes it to Harry.

 

In the end, it’s almost too easy to get McCall.

Lucas charges past him, knowing Ros is close behind, will take care of the bastard. He can feel his stomach throbbing as he runs, feel the blood pulsing, the pain spreading. He just needs to get there in time, he can do this, he knows he can.

There are too many fucking abandoned warehouses and factories in this fucking city, and they’re all dark and hazardous and there’s no way of knowing what floor Mani’s on, what room he’s in.

He can’t get so close and fail now.

 

The top floor, of course it’s the top fucking floor. His whole torso is burning. He reaches for his gun, feels something tear, hopes it's skin, rather than stitches.

He sees - 

Mani, silhouetted against the window

the bright white of Harry’s shirt, red on the sleeve

the glint of light on the knife as it swings round

he shoots, twice.

 

In the silence after the body hits the ground he hears Ros’ footsteps behind him.

 

Ruth is crying, messily, quietly, trying to hide it.

Harry looks like - Lucas can’t begin to decode his expression. He just doesn’t ever want to see it again.

He turns away, past Ros, fumbles his gun back into his jacket. Uses the wall for support as he goes down the stairs.

 

Outside, he checks the street. Empty apart from their car. He hitches his shirt up, gritting his teeth against the pain. There’s blood on the dressing, but not much.

He pops two codeine from the pack in his pocket, finds a half drunk warm bottle of water in the car to wash them down. Lets himself carefully down into the passenger seat. Ros is going to have to do the driving.

Eyes closed, he waits for his pulse to get back to normal. The sun is warm again today.

Maybe tomorrow  he’ll get to lie in a park.

 

* * *

 

Later, back on the grid, he watches Harry’s face as he tells them about Ruth. Harry is a fucking terrible liar, but he’s very good at hiding whatever emotions he feels.

Lucas thinks again of how Harry trusted Ruth, trusted her to be his secret keeper, his co-conspirator.

He knows how hard it is to trust, and sometimes, how terribly easy it is.

And what must it feel like, when that trust becomes a weapon for others?

 

He wants to talk to Harry, but he also knows, looking at him, that now is not the time. He can give him a few days.

 

~

 _The bird a nest, the spider a web, man friendship._  

 

When he realises that Malcolm is not there, he isn’t surprised. Not after an all nighter. It’s only when he’s walking past Malcolm’s desk, pulling on his jacket to leave, that he notices.

Malcolm isn’t one for personal stuff at work, for pictures and plants on his desk. But he is one for books. There’s usually a pile from the research people, and some new ones still with their price labels on, and always, always, his small, well thumbed clutch of paperbacks, all of them poetry.

It’s the poetry that’s missing.

 

“He’s resigned,” Harry says, quietly, from across the room. He’s looking at Lucas like there’s no more to be said.

“Just like that?” Lucas asks, incredulous.

Harry sighs.

“You know it’s never ‘just like that,’ Lucas,” he says.

Lucas does know, he’s heard it before, seen it before. He just never thought that would be Malcolm. Never thought Malcolm had got to that point.

He thinks back to how he snapped at Malcolm this afternoon.

Even if that hadn’t been their last interaction, he’d want to see him.

 

~

 

“Lucas,” Malcolm says wearily, opening the door in his socks.

“I’m sorry, Malcolm,” Lucas says, suddenly unsure if he’s doing the right thing. He half turns away.

“No, come in. I should have told you.”

It’s so like Malcolm to blame himself for wanting a quiet exit.

Lucas sits on the sofa while Malcolm makes tea. There are so many things he could say to him, and he knows he won’t say any of them. But he thinks Malcolm knows them anyway.

They sit in silence, drinking their tea. Lucas is more tired than he realised. Malcolm looks years older. But it’s not uncomfortable.

 

“Was it Blake?” Lucas asks, after a while. Malcolm looks up, barks out a short laugh. His smile is genuine.

“You know I’m never going to tell you,” he says. He pauses, like he’s thinking, and then says, disconcertingly, “You know, Lucas, I’m incredibly glad I didn’t have to do it.”

Lucas blinks, embarrassed, touched. He thinks of how many poems Malcolm has read, over the years, how many funerals he’s been to. And each poem a thoughtfulness, a piece of himself. It is a great kindness from a kind man.

“Well, when I die of old age I hope you’ll still be there to read it, whatever it is,” Lucas says, half flippant, half serious.

“Amen to that,” Malcolm says, raising his mug in a toast.

 

At the door, Lucas turns back, puts a hand on Malcolm’s arm.

“Thank you,” he says, quietly, seriously.

Malcolm ducks his head, half nodding, half awkward.

“Take care of yourself, Lucas.”

 

Lucas walks away, into the darkening evening. There are so many things in his head to think about; Malcolm, Harry, Harry-and-Ruth, the whole mess of the day and the layers of deception and cover and mistrust.

But instead he spends the journey home trying to work out just which Blake poem exactly it was that Malcolm had chosen for his funeral.

By the time he gets back to the flat, he’s still not decided.

 

* * *

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> [jennytheshipper](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Jennytheshipper/pseuds/Jennytheshipper) cast her beady eyes over this as usual. She listened sympathetically as I wailed about Sarah fucking Caulfield and how much I didn't want to write her. Her reward is getting to flail at me about Harry and Ruth. 
> 
> Also there is _far too much_ plot in this episode for my liking, and I've always thought Malcolm deserved more for his exit than he got.


End file.
